Living is a Problem Because Everything Dies
by HedgieX
Summary: One evening, after a parent screams at her for failing their child, Nicki snaps. And when she snaps, she takes the gun from her underwear drawer and shoots Michael and Lorraine. Tom is prepared to go to any length to protect her, including taking the blame so that she can go free, but will Nicki ever be able to forgive herself for the terrible mistakes she's made?


**The title of this story is taken from a song by Biffy Clyro. As usual, I don't own anything to do with Waterloo Road, as much as I wish I did.**

Chapter One:

Nicki didn't even make it up the front steps to her flat before the tears started falling. She sank down on the top step and brought her knees up to her chest and sobbed into them, and the position reminded her of the way she'd sat on her army camp bed the first time she'd killed a man.

There'd been blood behind her fingernails from her attempts to give him CPR, although his guts had been spilling out into the sand. She'd only moved when a bullet had brushed past her, so close it grazed her cheek, and she'd realised she would die too unless she moved.

It wasn't pulling the trigger that hurt, because she'd done that so many times in training that it was as routine as spreading jam on toast; it was the fact that it could have been him killing her. Fighting for his country just as she was fighting for hers. And maybe he had a family who'd get the worst news of their life in a couple of days, when a soldier turned up at their door.

One of her neighbours came up the steps cautiously. She didn't know his name, he was one of those people you talked about the weather with occasionally when you were locking your front door, but never really gave a second thought to. They lived in such a horrible, self-obsessed world.

"Are you alright, ma'am?"

She ignored him, and so he went away. She thought that she should try ignoring people more often, then maybe they wouldn't make her feel so awful. The youngsters had called her 'ma'am' after her promotion, when they were still squeaky clean new soldiers playing cricket in the back yard of the camp, when they'd yet to experience murder.

Nicki stayed curled up for a long time, letting the world turn around her. A wild rabbit scampered past, sheltering under the hedgerow, and she thought how nice it would be if she was a rabbit, when your only worries were finding some grass to eat and burrowing into the soil to hide away at night. Rabbits didn't ever have to worry about failing anyone.

She felt the spit on her face again as she remembered the way Scout's mother had screamed at her. "You've failed her."

"I've done my best," Nicki had said softly.

"You've failed my daughter, you scruffy bitch. She put all of her trust in you, and you treated her like shit in return. You trot around in your high heels thinking you're the bees' feet, and all that time she's trying to tell you it wasn't her and you're just being a little shit in return, it's just–"

There were many things that Nicki had wanted to point out: a) that it was a bit hypocritical to call _her_ a scruffy bitch. Then b) that she didn't wear high heels, c) that it was the bees' knees rather than feet, and d) that she'd done her hardest to help Scout, and she felt shit about what had happened, she really did.

Out of those, d) was the most important to her. But he didn't say any of them to Scout's mother. She watched from behind the sign in front of her with 'Miss Boston, Head of PRU' scrawled on it' as Tom noticed the scuffle and came across; he quickly convinced her to leave Nicki alone once by offering her a chocolate biscuit from the staff room.

"You failed her," she yelled from the doorway before Tom slammed the door behind them and led her away.

"Sorry, Miss," Scout said, "She doesn't mean it. She– she's always sort of protective of me, you know?"

"It's alright. I did fail you."

"No, Miss, you didn't, it's–"

"I've got to go." And then she'd gone home. She'd seen Tom in the corridor and he'd gestured to her that he wanted to talk, so she'd slipped out of the side door and driven home. Her phone kept vibrating against her thigh; she thought that it was probably him, trying to comfort her, tell her she wasn't a failure at all.

Now she was sitting on the step, smudging her mascara down her face as she swiped at her tears. She wondered why all of the packets of crisps in the world went out of date on a Saturday. She wondered why so much time was wasted worrying about Saturdays when the other six days held just as much potential.

Why had the world always been so cruel to her? She had nothing to show for being thirty-something, no friends, no possessions. She'd finally been unable to cope with the army, and now she was floating at Waterloo Road, sinking in misery whilst she taught children whose lives were only just beginning. Maybe their lives would turn out to be just as shit as hers had been.

Why did nobody take you to one side when you first went to school, and just warn you not to have dreams, because they were exactly that, dreams. Happiness was always right in front of Nicki, but whenever she took a step forwards, it had moved again, always teasing her, always making sure she knew it was a myth.

A boy walked past wearing a baggy jumper, his hood pulled over his head to conceal his eyes. He dropped a crisp packet at the bottom of the stairs, and she jumped up and screamed after him to pick it up, but he ignored her and was swallowed up by the blackness. She hadn't realised how dark it had become.

She retrieved the packet of crisps; it was damp. She hadn't realised it was raining either, but her hair was drenched, water running down her face so that she could no longer tell which droplets were tears.

Walkers, smoky bacon-flavoured. She squinted to check the date on the back of the packet: 08/11/14. Who decided that? Why would an extra day matter, in the scheme of things, when people were dying for their countries on the other side of the world? She took the crisp packet inside with her, and once she'd unlocked her front door she put it in the bin.

She moved through to the bathroom and washed her face, turning the water grey. Then she went to the bedroom and sat on her bed with a photograph of her team cradled on her lap.

Jack on the left, who'd seemed wasted in the army because of how good at maths he was, but then it was always useful to have him on her team for the _Countdown_ games they played to keep their spirits up in camp. Then Thomas, who'd been ridiculously unfit, and then Jack 2, who was the best gunman she'd ever seen, and then Nicki.

After her came Sarah and Kieran, both of whom had died the day before she'd finally resigned. Sarah had been the closest friend Nicki had ever had, the kindest woman in the world. In the photo, Kieran had his arm around Sarah. They'd been engaged, and after the tour they'd wanted to have a baby. It had been Nicki's fault they'd died, and now she'd failed Scout too.

She dropped the photo and rummaged through her underwear drawer until she found her gun, and then she sat on the bed crying onto the cool metal barrel and wishing she was a rabbit, because then she wouldn't be forced to do what she was about to do.

XxXxX

**Since I'm pretty much tying up the loose ends in **_**Bleeding Love**_** now, I decided I needed a new project to keep me sane during my revision. This story came from a conversation with Never-Clip-My-Wings-x about how Michael, Tom and Lorraine might leave Waterloo Road (although I hope it doesn't happen like this).**

**As usual, I'll love you forever if you leave a review, and ideas for future chapters would also be greatly appreciated x**


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